


Misplaced

by thehoyden



Category: Jeeves & Wooster
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-15
Updated: 2009-11-15
Packaged: 2017-10-03 00:40:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehoyden/pseuds/thehoyden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>'Pour one for yourself, Jeeves, if you've a mind.  I've been thinking this over, and my question to you is this: how do you know when something is gone?'</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Misplaced

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [](http://bookshop.livejournal.com/profile)[**bookshop**](http://bookshop.livejournal.com/) for the beta, [](http://oxoniensis.livejournal.com/profile)[**oxoniensis**](http://oxoniensis.livejournal.com/) for both beta and Britpick, and to [](http://kalpurna.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://kalpurna.livejournal.com/)**kalpurna** for audiencing and getting me into this lovely fandom in the first place.

I was halfway through a poached egg and still steaming at the ears from Jeeves' usual restorative when Jeeves handed me the morning newspaper and coughed in that particular way of his which sounded like a goat making its presence known.

'Yes, Jeeves?' I said.

'Sir, I wonder if you might recall the events of last evening. Specifically, in regard to the whereabouts of your new hat.'

I patted my head, which was a bit of a daft act even for old Bertram, because Jeeves would never allow me to catch any number of winks while any headgear was on the old onion. Even a festive sleeping cap that I had once acquired was deemed inappropriate, and though I was firm with Jeeves re. the state of civilisation if a man can't wear a bit of colour in the privacy of his own bedchamber, the sleeping cap was forced to depart from this mortal coil due to a strange confluence of events involving a small dog's exceptionally sharp teeth and my tendency to thrash a bit when in the throes of a nightmare.

'Well,' I said at last. 'I had it when we left the theatre, for certain, because Barmy told me three times that he thought it was quite spiffy, and that was before we'd even started sampling the new drink at the Birmingham.'

'Was that the last establishment you frequented yesterday evening, sir?'

I took a fortifying sip of tea. 'Yes, I think so, though I don't quite remember how I got home.'

Jeeves gave me a look, and I tried not to squirm in my bed, because while I truthfully did not recall the cab ride back to Berkley Mansions, I did have a few hazy images of the night before, or -- no, impressions, that's the word I want, impressions of warmth and Jeeves pouring me into bed, and I might have--

'Sir?' Jeeves said, and foremost in my mind was the impression that at some point while Jeeves was disrobing the young master, said young master had curled his fingers into the back of said Jeeves' hair.

'Sorry, old thing, I was woolgathering. What was I saying?' I said, and batted my eyelashes in a way that Aunt Dahlia always says makes me look even lighter on the grey matter than usual.

'The Birmingham, sir. I'll telephone them directly to inquire after your hat.'

'Thank you, Jeeves. No need to rush, though -- it's only a hat. Why, I seem to recall having had hats set on fire without so much as a blink from you.'

Perhaps the casual observer would not have noticed, but it seemed to me there was a distinct softening around the eyes of Jeeves' customary stuffed-frog expression. 'If I may be so bold, sir, none of those hats, incinerated or otherwise, suited you half as well.'

Woosters are made of stern stuff, but they are also cursed with a fair complexion that readily reveals any and all embarrassment. 'Oh. Well. Telephone away, Jeeves.'

'Very good, sir.'

***

Dogs are strange beasts. Not at all like cats, who are quite jolly creatures -- give Bertram a cat over a dog any day of the week, that's what I always say.

'At least he has never attempted to gnaw on the old ankle, what?' I said to Jeeves while walking my Aunt Agatha's Aberdeen terrier 'round the park.

'If I may say, sir, canines do appear to have an unfortunate fixation upon that part of your anatomy,' Jeeves said, walking closely beside me, leash in hand. Customarily, Jeeves took the dog out by himself, but the weather was fine, and I'd asked if he wouldn't mind a bit of company on his dog-induced excursion.

'Too true, Jeeves,' I said. 'Alas, you know as well as I that if there is one road to Aunt Agatha's heart, it is through McIntosh, here. I don't think I'm overstating things when I say that she loves the pup more than all her nephews combined.'

Now, this is the sort of statement that tempts the whatsits -- what I mean to say is, if there are indeed three lady deities of varying ages sitting around with spinning wheels and whatnot, perhaps one ought to avoid statements that rile them up and make them start snipping threads. Or in this case, a dog leash.

'McIntosh!' I called, fear seizing my heart when the dog took off, sans leash, after a member of the rodent family.

But the topping weather meant that more than a few people were strolling around with dogs or even children, and despite my best efforts -- not that I was ever first in races at Eton, but my pins are longish and have served me well -- McIntosh vanished out of sight.

'Jeeves!' I bleated, only to realise he was standing right beside me, head turning this way and that as he scoured the square for any sign of errant terrier. I looked as well, but a grim despair began to take root. 'I'm finished,' I told Jeeves sadly. 'There's no telling what Aunt Agatha will do to me for losing her soul's delight, but I'll tell you one thing: it won't be good. Best to put an ocean between us, what? Maybe two. If we go to Austria, Jeeves, you could roam the coral thingummys after some exotic fish.'

'I believe you mean Australia, sir, and while I am not opposed to a visit, I hardly think a permanent relocation will be necessary,' he said.

I turned to him, hope in my heart. 'Jeeves,' I said fervently, 'if that great brain of yours has hit upon some solution, let's have it.'

'If you would follow me, sir,' he said, with a slight guiding touch on my elbow.

Jeeves led us around the corner, and around one more, and there, in front of a butcher shop was McIntosh, waiting outside the door with every expression of doggy happiness, completely oblivious to the sufferings of nephews who could have been rent from limb to limb in the event of his disappearance.

'I say, Jeeves, how did you know the dog would be here?' I said, snatching the dog up with considerable relief.

Jeeves coughed delicately. 'McIntosh is accustomed to walking on the same route, never deviating, and it is often that Mr. Hartley, who is very fond of dogs in general and Aberdeen terriers in particular, will consent to provide the dog with a bit of marrow. I theorised that McIntosh may have simply elected to skip to the dessert course, as it were.'

'Jeeves, you are the best of all possible Jeeveses,' I told him sincerely, gratitude and affection warring for a dominant place in the old Wooster heart. If it wouldn't have been so bally inappropriate, not to mention impractical what with holding the dog, I would have thrown thankful arms around his shoulders.

'I endeavour to give satisfaction, sir,' he said, refastening the leash to McIntosh's collar. If his fingertips brushed mine while doing so, well, it can hardly be helped when you have a dog wiggling like a fish in your arms upon catching sight of his beloved, marrow-bearing butcher.

***

It was no good -- I got to the middle bit, and the only thing I could remember was Catsmeat coughing because he'd laughed so hard that some of his drink had gone down the wrong way. I let my fingers trickle along the keys for a time, hoping the memory of that melody would come back to me.

'Would you care for some refreshment, sir?' Jeeves asked, but there was something soupy in his tone. And no wonder -- I'd been trying to play the song off and on throughout the whole afternoon, and while Jeeves is as hidebound regarding music as he is on fashion, and possesses what I might call some unreasonable prejudices toward harmless instruments that twang, he was surely as frustrated as old Bertram at this distinct lack of success in retrieving a few lost notes from the unreliable grey matter.

'Yes, thank you,' I said, because when two strong-willed men live together, it's a matter of knowing when a chap ought to bend. I let the piano alone and made my way to the sofa, fingertips still drumming out the melody against my leg.

He handed me a glass of the old b. and s., and then gave that cough of his, and said, 'Is something troubling you, sir?'

I noticed his eye was drawn toward my restless fingers. 'Just missing a few bars, I think -- it's a rummy thing, isn't it, when the memory won't serve up what's needed?'

'Indeed, sir,' Jeeves said.

'Perhaps if I ate more fish,' I said, starting to feel sulky about the whole business.

'Would you like me to revise this evening's dinner menu, sir?'

I gave this due consideration; Jeeves had somehow talked one of Anatole's corking fish recipes out of that esteemed cook, and Jeeves, while no Anatole, was still quite a deft hand in the kitchen. But then, I'd tried Jeeves' patience enough for one afternoon; no sense in interfering in his dinner preparations as well. So I smiled and said airily, 'No, I'll leave the fish to the deserving, old thing,' and raised my glass in his direction.

'It is kind of you to say so, sir,' Jeeves said, and made to pop off for the kitchen. But then he did a most un-Jeeves like thing: he stopped in the doorway and hesitated. 'Perhaps, sir, if you sang the accompanying lyrics, it might refresh your memory.'

That stopped me cold. 'How do you know there are lyrics?' I'd been exceedingly careful, I'd thought -- no singing, no mouthing of words. It wasn't the kind of song one sang in front of aunts, or any kind of mixed company for that matter. And in my case, it was certainly not the kind of evidence one wanted to bandy about in front of fish-fed valets who were bound to put a few clues together.

Jeeves' expression didn't alter. 'It seems the sort of song that calls for them, does it not, sir?'

I laughed nervously. 'Well, if the Wooster brain can't cough up a few notes, I'm afraid lyrics are totally beyond it.'

He looked at me steadily for one moment, before saying, 'Most distressing, sir. Will dinner at the usual hour be agreeable?'

'Oh, rather,' I said, terribly grateful to have escaped with the lie.

***

Let this be a lesson to you: should you be out and about, carousing with various Drones in the depths of midwinter, and if there should also happen to be an incident where it looks like a combination of a not-so-frozen public fountain, marmalade, and one half of a two-person horse costume will be in the offing, I advise you to give the whole bally thing a miss.

I told Jeeves as much, although I think I drifted off somewhere in the middle, and I had considerable difficulty in relating just why the horse costume was of crucial importance re. the above scenario.

My rarely called-upon physician came round at some point, made some clucking noises about lungs and fluid and half-frozen young idiots, which may have been a reference to Wooster, B., but I decided I would have to ask Jeeves to be certain.

'Jeeves,' I said gravely. 'All-frozen. Not half?'

'Indeed, sir,' Jeeves said, and there was something soothing about his voice. 'How are you feeling, sir?'

I heard a floaty kind of sigh, but it didn't seem to be from Jeeves, which is just as well as I doubt very much that a f. k. of s. is in Jeeves' repertoire. 'I say, Jeeves, I think I've lost the old grey cells. Or they don't work properly. What do you think I should do about that?'

'I think you should rest, sir, perhaps after another dose of medicine,' Jeeves said. He helped me sit up a bit, one warm arm propping me up, and brought a small glass to my lips. I'm well-used to Jeeves presenting me with restorative preparations, and swallowed it obediently.

'One of yours?' I asked, and pulled a face at the aftertaste. Jeeves' concoctions are liable to leave one's hair standing on end, and there is some possibility of one's eyeballs ricocheting across the room, but this seemed to lack that particular punch.

'I'm afraid not, sir. Your physician left it with me.'

'Yours are better,' I hastened to assure him. 'Yours are always better. Everything.'

Things felt even floatier than before, but I thought I could discern the shadow of an indulgent smile tugging at the corner of Jeeves' mouth. 'Thank you, sir.'

'Everything,' I said insistently, because I didn't think he was understanding me fully -- unusual, that, because Jeeves is in possession of an admirable brain and usually knows what I mean even when I don't or when I mix it all up. 'You are,' I told him.

He lowered me gently back, his hands tucking the heaps of blankets around me. I recognised the trim from the duvet he must have scavenged from the guestroom, and could feel the radiating heat of a hot water bottle near my toes. And even through my haze and the rather princess and the pea scenario -- well, except with blankets instead of mattresses, and obviously I was lying under and not over, and there was a distinct lack of any legumes whatsoever -- I fancied I could feel the warmth of his hip against my side where he perched on the bed.

I rather expected him to biff off and do whatever it is that Jeeves does when the young master is occupied or out of commission, but instead he settled into a chair he'd drawn near the bed. My eyelids gradually became far too heavy to keep open, and I let them fall shut.

It was all warmth and dark and quiet after that, but at some point, I thought I heard a sigh, and not a floaty one or a goat-like one, either. And then a voice said, 'Oh, sir,' in a tone I'm not accustomed to hearing -- it was a bit like the one time my Aunt Dahlia had clutched me tight and told me never, ever, _ever_ to worry her like that again.

***

It's been some time since I turned over things to Jeeves, and despite the fact that rather large portions of the countryside are now convinced that I am a dangerous lunatic, on the whole things run much smoother than before. And Jeeves, fine fellow that he is, does occasionally indulge the young master in a mood to wax philosophic. Or poetic. Both, perhaps? Well, whichever; I put the question to Jeeves after he'd served up the evening nightcap.

'Pour one for yourself, Jeeves, if you've a mind. I've been thinking this over, and my question to you is this: how do you know when something is gone?'

Jeeves raised his eyebrow a quarter of an inch, but obediently mixed up a b. and s. for himself and sat near me on the sofa. 'Gone, sir?'

'Piff! into the beyond, as they say.'

'Indeed, sir. Perhaps if you could specify the item in question?'

'What does it matter?'

'With respect, sir, one does not like to equate socks with more intangible possessions, such as one's health or memory.'

I chewed that over for a minute. 'Well, intangible whatsits, I should think. If socks are gone, they are gone, and if there's a dog in the situation, the evidence may yet remain, if in much distressed form.'

Jeeves took a thoughtful sip from his glass. 'Perhaps, sir, you might reflect upon the evidence that such intangibles leave behind.'

'Well, that's the thing, isn't it? Intangible things aren't like half-eaten socks. You don't just go discovering said evidence mouldering under a wardrobe. So how would you know it was gone?'

Perhaps it was the lateness of the hour, and the rather chummy circumstances I had coaxed him into, but Jeeves gave me a look that I wouldn't mind describing as being on the piercing side of things. 'In that case, sir, it may be that a second party can discern what may have gone missing. For it is our closest companions, is it not, who may observe such a change?'

'Well, I don't think I could count on old Barmy for the diagnosis,' I said doubtfully.

'Mr. Fotheringay-Phipps was not the barometer I had in mind, sir.'

I licked my lips once. 'Who would you suggest, then?'

Jeeves kept those marvellous eyes locked on mine. 'Even if locating the misplaced did not fall under my purview as your valet, I would consider it a privilege.'

I had long dared to count Jeeves as a friend, but these moments when the old feudal spirit would subside and allow him to acknowledge the same still brought warmth to my cheeks. 'Likewise, old thing. Although I can't imagine what you might lose that I could discover.'

'Can you not, sir?'

That brought me up short -- I do have a tendency to babble, as various aunts have put it and I'm not sure they're wrong, but I felt struck dumb by the intensity of his tone.

'Can you not conceive that one might recognise loss when it is shared?'

'Jeeves?' I croaked, barely able to draw in the necessary air.

He set his glass aside and gently removed mine from where it dangled at my nerveless fingertips. 'I have compared the evidence, sir, and I would venture to say that the possession in question is quite irretrievable.'

My head whirled as I tried to assemble the relevant facts. There are times for delicacy, but also times when a chap has to make absolutely certain that he knows what is what. 'Jeeves, do you mean to say that I -- that you -- that we--'

Jeeves so rarely smiles, and even then, they are small, understated affairs, but I fancy none of them were quite like this one, this tender upturning of the corners of his mouth. 'For my part, sir, I consider it well lost.'

'Oh!' I said. 'I mean to say -- you must know that I -- well, obviously for sometime there's been a certain whatsit to the--'

And then Jeeves kissed me.

'Oh, rather,' I said sometime later, after circumstances had taken a distinct turn toward the French. 'Well, as far as I'm concerned, Jeeves, my heart isn't lost so much as relocated, and I've never had cause to complain about your stewardship.'

'I endeavour to give satisfaction, sir,' Jeeves said, and made good on his word.

***

I lost something else that night; Jeeves informs me that it's also of the irretrievable variety, but good riddance, that's what I say -- there are some things, it seems, that we can misplace with joyful impunity.


End file.
